As I was preparing to publish Humble Talent’s comment regarding the state of feminism, a new commenter, a feminist herself, weighed in on the president of NOW’s hateful and bigoted blanket indictment on men. Thus I am pairing the comments as complementary.

Getting back to the topic of Toni Van Pelt, someone that I feel really good about myself for mustering the willpower to not mock, kind of puts a face to something I’ve known… But maybe not known how to put into words, for quite a while now.

“Feminists” aren’t bad people, generally. The vast majority of feminists really do believe in equality of the sexes. They’re people, men and women, who were told that feminism is just about equality, they believed it, and they went on with their life. They can even be forgiven that, because despite people identifying as “feminist” being less than 20% of the American population and 13% of the British population, basically every talking head on mainstream news is, and they refuse to comment on anything that puts feminism in a negative light.

Therefore, they can be forgiven for not knowing about Toni Van Pelt, head of NOW, who hates men, and thinks we’re all criminals. They can be forgiven for not knowing Nancy Silberkleit, who inherited Archie Comics and called her male co-workers “penis” at meetings. They can be forgiven for not knowing about Mary Koss, who nudged the CDC in a way that defined rape as something that only happens only to women, and only by men (men are now “forced to penetrate”), they can be forgiven for not knowing Valerie Solanas, author of the SCUM (Society For Cutting Up Men) manifesto, who shot Andy Warhol because… reasons. They could be forgiven for not knowing Robin Miller, editor of Ms. Magazine, who said “I feel that ‘man-hating’ is an honourable and viable political act, that the oppressed have a right to class-hatred against the class that is oppressing them.” Or the late, best-selling, sex negative feminist Andrea Dworkin, who said “I want to see a man beaten to a bloody pulp with a high-heel shoved in his mouth, like an apple in the mouth of a pig.”

Authors open up a whole new barn door. How about Sally Miller Gearhart, author of six toxic sludgepools, who said “The proportion of men must be reduced to and maintained at approximately 10% of the human race,” or Marilyn French, who penned more than 30 ill-conceived tomes, and who wrote “All men are rapists and that’s all they are”.

And So. Many. Others.

And what sticks out about this list is that these women aren’t small potatoes wackadoos hanging out yelling at people on corners in New York City. They are leaders. Published, best-selling authors, editors, government officials, and CEOs. If feminism was a church, these are its Cardinals.

These people exist, these things happened, and they’re held up like folk heroes and legends by a small but influential slice of the feminist pie. It’s why I think that feminism has too much baggage and is too toxic for mainstream acceptance: While I know that the vast majority of feminists are probably fair-weather, coffee-shop types, I can’t easily tell which are the ones that sleep with a SCUM manifesto under their pillows.

When the alt-Right first started getting traction, I thought I could almost belong there. They seemed to stand for a whole lot of things that I do: Free Speech, an opposition to social justice extremism, prudent fiscal policy, skepticism… among others positions. It took me a while to realize that it was either being slowly co-opted by really shitty people, or it was always made up of really shitty people trying to put lipstick on a pig to gain mainstream support, and long before Charlottesville. I realized that the movement was toxic, and even the people in Charlottesville who weren’t all in on the Nazi iconography had to be able to look around at the fuckwits they were walking beside and see that those aren’t the kind of people you want to associate yourself with. They should have known better.

“Feminists” need to go through a similar process, but it’s harder, because the toxicity is more diluted in feminism. Nevertheless it is still there, and it’ is irredeemable.

Now here is the co-COTD by things we’re afraid to say in public, yet:

I am a woman who was shocked and horrified by her comments. They are bigoted, hateful and totally unacceptable. I didn’t realize that NOW had been taken over by the anti-male victimhood cult of identity politics.

I believe that many women, feminists included, are against this aspect of third wave ‘feminism’ but we are temporarily afraid to speak out at this present time except anonymously. Unfortunately it’s recently become very dangerous to dissent because of the online SJW mobs who mobilize to destroy the livelihood of anyone who dares to publicly voice such heretical thoughts. Their fury is especially intense for dissident feminists because they see us as apostates and traitors.

So you are not alone in your outrage. It’s painful to see a ‘leader’ in her position undermining the hard work of American women and men who worked together to achieve equal rights for all.

Because that’s what feminism should still be about– everyone having equal rights and an opportunity to participate in society. It’s about the right to vote, the right to own and inherit property, and the right to pursue happiness. It’s about freedom and due process. It’s about having an equal opportunity to compete for educational and career opportunities, and to participate in the free marketplace of ideas.

I do damn her comments, and I will always be against bigotry and sexism whether it’s against women or men. Just as I trust that American men will continue to support equality and freedom for the millions of women across the world who still do not have basic rights. American men earned this trust and deserve honor because they are the ones who voted for American women to have the right to vote.

Let us remain united and true to our values and our shared vision, and not allow professional victims to divide us with the hateful rhetoric of identity politics.

“I believe that many women, feminists included, are against this aspect of third wave ‘feminism’ but we are temporarily afraid to speak out at this present time except anonymously. Unfortunately it’s recently become very dangerous to dissent because of the online SJW mobs who mobilize to destroy the livelihood of anyone who dares to publicly voice such heretical thoughts. Their fury is especially intense for dissident feminists because they see us as apostates and traitors.”

I don’t disagree with you with the broad strokes of this, but I think that in writing this out, in the way you enunciate the problem, you are probably more aware of the toxicity in your movement than the vast majority of other people in it, and your continued silence (even though I agree, it’s smart policy), makes it much harder for that toxicity to be “temporary”. Because of this, I can’t envision what the return to sanity looks like, it’s why I refer to the movement as irredeemable.